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Scientists Named Microscopic Creature After JoJo Stand

Scientists love anime and some have gone as far as expressing it in their research. Creatures like the velvet worm Eoperipatus totoro was named after the Studio Ghibli creature, several asteroids are named for prominent creators like Jiro Taniguchi and Moyoco Anno while a whole galaxy was named after Katsuhiro Otomo's Akira. There's a strain of roses bred and named for The Rose of Versailles manga, and reseachers in Japan went as far as to name a protein after Pikachu.

If you're not surfing through peer-reviewed scientific magazines, it's easy to miss the latest anime-inspired discovery. Twitter user Peachpetals_ came across a Jojo-reference in the May 2013 issue of Zoological Science. Scientists Shinta Fujimoto and Katsumi Miyazaki discovered a new species in the marine tardigrade family of Neostygarctidae and named the creature Neostygarctus lovedeluxe.

Tardigrades or "water bears" are microscopic animals. Fujimoto and Miyazaki discovered this new species in an underwater cave in Japan's Miyako Islands, the first instance of a Neostygarctidae found in the Pacific ocean.

The scientists lay out the reference lovedeluxe in the creature's name.

The specific epithet, lovedeluxe, refers to ‘Love Deluxe’, the name of a supernatural power enabling one to have complete control over one's hair, which appeared in JoJo's Bizarre Adventure Part 4: Diamond Is Unbreakable, a famous Japanese manga written and illustrated by Hirohiko Araki. The hairy appearance of the new species appears as if affected by the power of ‘Love Deluxe’.

The Stand is used by the character Yukako Yamagishi and is in turn a reference to the Sade album of the same name that was released in 1992.

Source: Shinta Fujimoto and Katsumi Miyazaki "Neostygarctus lovedeluxe n. sp. from the Miyako Islands, Japan: The First Record of Neostygarctidae (Heterotardigrada: Arthrotardigrada) from the Pacific," Zoological Science 30(5), 414-419, (1 May 2013). via Peachpetals_